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When liberal bloggers attack

The New York Times has a story out today about how liberal bloggers are targeting KSFO-AM’s Melanie Morgan, her co-host Lee Rodgers, and other members of their drive time morning show over allegedly ‘hateful’ and ‘violent’ remarks they’ve supposedly made on their radio program. The bloggers have gone so far as to contact some of the show’s advertisers, play cherry-picked clips, and gotten some of the advertisers to pull their ads.

Noel Sheppard at Newsbusters has a must-read post today which gives you many more facts about this case which you won’t find in the NYT article or the liberal blogs who are on the march to get Morgan, Rodgers, and others on their radio program off the air. The key point Sheppard makes, which I agree with, is that the far left bloggers waging this campaign are not waging it in order to ‘make the airwaves cleaner’ – they’re doing it because they don’t like viewpoints expressed contrary to their own. He also provides context for the ‘hateful’ remarks made, and while I’d say I wouldn’t have made the remarks, they are far from what the ‘outraged’ lefty bloggers made them out to be.

This is nothing new for the leftosphere, who acted similarly when the Washington Post decided to hire a conservative blogger for a blog they created at their news site called “Red America” in March of 2006. They targeted the blogger, Ben Domenech, not because they were ‘concerned’ that he might be a plagiarist, but because they were incensed that the Washington Post had the nerve to add a conservative blogger to its roster of bloggers. In the end, I think the blog was up for barely a week before liberals had dug up enough information on Ben Domenech to forward on to the Washington Post higher-ups, and the result was that Domenech resigned. As I wrote in my post about the controversy, it was wrong of Domenech to do what he did, and that it was good that he resigned, but what was just as reprehensible were the liberal bloggers who targeted him simply because he was a conservative posting at the Washington Post. These are the same people who will assert every day that the administration is working hard to take away your right to dissent, so the level of hypocrisy displayed by these nitwits shouldn’t be lost on anyone who pays attention to the unwritten far left rule of ‘do as I say, not as I do.’

Sheppard’s write-up is long, but well worth the time it takes to read it, especially if you’re concerned at just what some far left bloggers will try next in order to attempt to silence the opposition.

112 thoughts on “When liberal bloggers attack”

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Fair is fair —
Reading the horrifically racist and mean spirited comments by those conservative talk show hosts is deeply disturbing — but no more disturbing than the insulting and mean spirited comments I’ve heard from the left. Ad-hominem does nothing to prove an argument and puts the offender’s intelligence and taste in question — but it is not illegal. Neither are boycotts. As proud as I am about our Constitutional right to free speech and protest, I am ashamed at the depths of crude discourse that has dominated our airways in the past 15 years or so. I long for the days when William F. Buckley and Gore Vidal debated and BOTH amused me with their polite (if biting) wit and BOTH made me think about the issues.
Frankly, as an educated liberal and simply as an informed citizen, whenever a debate or commentary resorts to “creep” and “traitor” and other meaningless slurs, I simply change the channel — no matter who is speaking. However, crude idiots have the same right to spew venom as intellgent debators in this great nation.

I lived in the Bay Area for 7 years and listened to KSFO most mornings on my commute from Concord to SF, I can tell you that there where MANY mornings when I would just turn Lee off. He’s bombastic where there’s no need to be, as I see it his comments do not represent any type of thoughtful or coherent speech. Lee gets angry and he blathers, sometimes going too far. In this case the decision really is up to the advertisers, if they felt that Lee went too far then they have to do what’s right for him. I don’t think anyone should be trying to remove him from the radio, even with these comments he and team are far from the worst out there.

But if people want to try then let em, it’s a free country, I’m not going to engage in that type of behaviour. I can’t stomach the filth that was Air America either, I dealt with it by just not listening or patronizing any station that aired it. As a consumer that’s my right and I’m going to exercise it as I see fit, it’s not censorship or some vast right wing conspiracy. It’s seemed to have worked so far as AA is on the rocks and having all kinds of problems…

The Dixie Chicks are fascinating because they *CHOSE* to bad mouth the President and their country overseas, they exercised their right to free speech and they made people mad (free speech DOES have consequences after all). The public reacted by flooding radio stations with calls telling them to pull all of their material, you can call it what you want. But when you’re a star in the public eye and you say something stupid, your going to pay for it, and so they have. They are breaking at last report because sales are down, concert attendance is way off and they are tired of everything being about natalie’s mouth and not their music.

But they ran to the press once the landslide started and claimed they where being ‘censored’, it was everyone else’s fault but theirs. Had Natalie kept her big mouth shut instead of showing just how stupid and ignorant she really is none of this would have happened.

As for Clear Channel, they are a business and they have to respond to their customers demands, they don’t HAVE to play anyones records if they don’t want too. You may or may not agree with that, but even a ‘Public’ radio station is after all a business and they make money from listener’s who buy from their advertisers. We can sit around all day and speculate but if I was running the place I would have pulled them too, they made themselves damaged goods and paid the price for it..

Great White’s ability to follow several threads at once seem to be as deficient as his reading comprehension, so I’ll make this really, really simple, so even the most obtuse (Great White, I’m talking to you) can follow it.

You have two cases here. Both involve people whose work depends on radio. Both say things that anger listeners. Those listeners then try to silence those people through pressure on advertisers, management, etc.

If you think that’s OK, then it’s OK in both cases. If you think it’s not OK, then it’s not OK in both cases.

I’m on record here as saying I don’t believe in silencing anyone, right or left.

It’s up to you to decide where you stand. But don’t try to pretend that the principle in these two cases is different, because it’s not. As much as you try to parse these two cases, the more you sound like a politician asking for the definition of is.

You’re either for unfettered speech or you’re not.

Now, as for Great White’s previous post, to point out all the fallacies and bone-headed assumptions would be a waste of time. Just GW’s use of the term strawman shows me that he honestly don’t understand the concept of what a strawman argument really is.

And GW, if you don’t understand why my choice of 1980 was anything but arbitrary, then your understanding of political history, especially in the context of our argument, is as sketchy as your reading comprehension. But I’ll give you a hint: Modern conservatism and the power of the religous right were both in ascendency. Therefore, I see it as the beginning of a new chapter in American politics and particularly germane to out discussion. Pretty simple stuff, I thought, but it might be a bit too simple for someone with your mad rhetorical skills.

Do I expect you to smack your forehead and say, “Oh, now I get it”? No. Because it would require honesty and open-mindedness on your part, and so far you’ve demonstrated neither.

But all of this reminds me of the old adage about arguing politics with a true believer – it’s like wrestling a pig. All you get is muddy and the pig enjoys it.

So, take your best shot here Great White, but know that I won’t be reading your response.

Tonight I’m going to go play music, have drinks with friends, and tomorrow I’ll go back to work on my new book. In other words, life is way too short to be wrestling with pigs.

Ah, well, you know you’ve got them on the run when they resort to the personal attacks, so I’ll just ignore most of DT’s final blurt of sophistry here. He still doesn’t understand the distinction between turning the dial and organizing to have a program discontinued. Well, fine.

But one point fairly screams for rebuttal:

Therefore, I see it as the beginning of a new chapter in American politics and particularly germane to out discussion.

In other words, DT wants to ignore anything predating his chosen timeline. Useful when you want no inconvenient history to intrude into your cocoon, I suppose.

At least you managed to get through an entire post without an anti-Christian diatribe. That’s progress of a sort.

tomorrow I’ll go back to work on my new book.

I think we were all supposed to be impressed or intimidated by that.
I do hope someone picked out a nice, short “new book” for you. With plenty of pictures. Start at page 1, and get help from an adult if the words are too big. Let’s hope it wasn’t written by a Christian – I’m sure that would ruin your day – or written before 1980 since that’s outside of your frame of reference. Have fun, and maybe you can write a short book report for us when you’ve finished reading it.

And any citizen has a free speech right to point out to an advertiser programs that the advertiser might approve of.

Correct. The citizen also has a responsibility, in doing so, to make the substance of the complaints accurate. In the KSFO case, that wasn’t so. For example, in one case the complainant cited racism – but when you listen to the entire audio clip in question, race was never mentioned, even peripherally. That was a fabrication, made for the purposes of suppressing dissent and destroying someone’s livelihood.

Even if all of the advertisers withdraw, the program could be streamed over the internet and supported by private contributions by listeners. Assuming, of course, that the listeners really do care enough about the program to pay for it.

I’m assuming you’re also keen on pulling the plug on NPR then, right? Based on their ratings, there aren’t enough listeners who care about them to pay for it.

Here’s the distinction: if a program running for over a decade has the ratings and the sponsorship to keep it on the air, then yes I do have the right to listen to it, no matter how much you may want that point of view suppressed.

You want to threaten the sponsors? Fine – that’s your right. Go for it, but be accurate about it, as we said above. And do keep in mind that once you make an issue of it – as you have – it’s entirely possible for the show’s audience to patronize those sponsors just to keep you from succeeding. If that doesn’t work, then all you can do is try to convince people not to listen.

By the way, the sponsor pressures do not appear to be working. As of Friday afternoon, when KSFO ran a special program on the controversy, it seems that exactly ONE sponsor bailed.

“Leftists” aren’t the only ones who point out speech they don’t like to the companies that give the speakers money. Ever heard of onemilliondads.com? Every time Ford puts an ad in a gay magazine, those bigots go ballistic! Today they’re ranting because FOX showed a t-shirt they didn’t like during a football game. They have a right to complain to advertisers, just like liberal people have a right to tell advertisers they’re supporting people who call Barack Obama a “halfrican”, ask people to call Allah a whore, or claim they’ve got a “bulls-eye” painted on Nancy Pelosi’s face.

If advertisers choose to continue to support this crap, fine. I don’t listen to it and never will. Melanie Morgan, in particular, is psycho. She suggested putting a NY Times reporter in the gas chamber! Is this something you support?

There’s nothing wrong with monitoring and reporting on the media and there’s nothing wrong with telling advertisers what you think about the programs they support. Even right-wing lunatics like the American Family Association do it.

Do you guys ever bother to engage the brain before putting your mouth in gear? Can you come up with nothing better than some DKos cut-and-paste inaccuracies?

Lets’ start with this one: “halfrican”

The KSFO hosts didn’t invent this term, or use it to be derogatory. Fact is, there’s a web site that markets Halfrican T-shirts, among them one saying “Halfrican – the best of both”. That’s what the KSFO hosts were alluding to. And you’d know that if you did even the slightest bit of research.

Again, you don’t listen to the tapes, so you have no idea what you’re talking about. In this case, a liberal called the show repeatedly, each time lying about his identity to get around the rules most stations have about limiting the number of times any one person can call in (what a shock – liberals caught in lies…). The last time, the lib pretended to be a from Germany and the host caught him in the lie and challenged him to make that statement to prove he was not a Muslim. Kind of low-class, yes. But if there’s anyone who has no status to complain about religious insensitivity, it’s you libs – you’re the guys who get your jollies putting crucifixes in urine, remember?

Next: a “bulls-eye” painted on Nancy Pelosi’s face.
Again, no context. I listened to the entire clip. Did you? No, I thought not. The clip, in context, referred to the bulls-eye strictly in a political sense. That might have even been obvious to you, had you bothered to check it.

Finally, this one: She suggested putting a NY Times reporter in the gas chamber! Is this something you support?

Once again, you have no clue what you’re talking about. First of all, it wasn’t a reporter, it was the editor. The exact context was that if (important word there, so try real hard to focus) the NYT editor were to be tried and convicted for treason, then the death penalty would be appropriate. Because, you see, treason happens to be a capital crime.

Then you say I don’t listen to it and never will.
WONDERFUL!!! THERE’S the solution. Just change the dial instead of trying to force anyone who disagrees with you off the air. Then this whole thing would blow away.

Liberals act with negligence. They convict in the public arena with false accusations and without due diligence.

Will TeeGee offer an apology for the mischaracterizations and laziness? No. For he/she is free in this country to be irresponsible. Thanks for your great service in setting the record straight and doing the due diligence. People like you are the epitome of excellence.

Liberals didn’t threaten to kill Melanie Morgan as conservatives did to the Dixie Chicks and Melanie Morgan suggested be done (that’s called a purge I belive – think stalin, hitler, pol pot) to “liberals”

Yeah, right, Beonda. Whose word do we have that death threats were made? Oh, right, the same lying lefies that couldn’t agree on the correct time of day.

Lefties lie about everything. If one says the sun will rise tomorrow morning I’m throwing away my sunblock and laying in a supply of light bulbs.

In fact, I’m willing to bet your real name isn’t “Beonda Pale.” In fact, I strongly doubt you actually posted what you claim to have posted. I even disbelieve your existence. Begone, lying nonexistent spectre of falsity!